The "Caress Of Steel" Campaign
Origins The "Caress Of Steel" campaign was inspired by the 1975 Rush album of the same name. Because of this, the story mostly featured the characters mentioned in the songs from the album, such as The Necromancer and By-tor and the Snow Dog (While this specific song is on the album Fly By Night, By-Tor is mentioned in The Necromancer as well). It also features mentioned locations, such as The Fountain of Lamneth. Story (WARNING: These facts are not 100 percent canon unless confirmed by the original Dungeon Master. I have tried to remember the events to the best of my ability, however. Some facts have also been added to give the story more continuity. These events have happened over the course of one year with a session each week.) The story begins in a small town by the name of Willowdale, where the main party resides. However, unknown to them, a dark presence looms overhead, always watching. This was The Necromancer, a powerful, evil spirit who viewed over his lands with all-seeing magic prism eyes. On a particularly dreadful day, he sent his minions of darkness to invade the village, which our heroes of the story fled. Our heroes made their way to the capital city of Megadon, where they approached the Syrinx Priests, the leaders of the country. The party explained to them that the land was in danger and asked for guidance. The Priests thought for a moment, then said that the only man able to defeat The Necromancer was a prince named By-Tor, though no one had seen him in decades. The party accepted the challenge and went off to search for By-Tor. Unfortunately, half of the party forgot the sacred rule of "priorities" and heard whispered tales of a magical place called The Fountain of Lamneth, a place with a fountain that gave eternal life. Thus, the party separated and basically split the campaign into two pieces, overall making things harder for the DM. What we will now give the name "The Fountain Party" then went off on their own adventure through the land to find the fountain. On their journeys, they encountered two tents in the middle of the woods, one red and one blue. They entered the red tent and were met with a ringmaster standing next to a coffin. They discovered that they were in a traveling circus. It was then that the ringmaster seemed to open the coffin with magic, and inside was a living corpse of a young woman. The ringmaster instructed the woman to attack, and thus the battle began. They were obviously defeated, and the party looted the tent for items and gold. The tents then burst into flames and the party ran off. They came across what seemed to be a harmless bridge when the sky began to darken suddenly. From the sky descended a large humanoid creature with a grotesque face, controlling a small puppet in the shape of a demon. After a long, bloody battle, the creature finally fell in defeat. To the party's surprise, the demon puppet was still alive and continued to fight, though it went down much easier. Meanwhile, "The By-Tor Party" trekked through what they believed to be the forest By-Tor resided in. After what was probably far too many sessions of gameplay dedicated to searching the forest, they finally found the prince of the forest himself, along with a dog-wolf hybrid with radiantly glowing fur. Much to their dismay, they found that By-Tor had forgotten English and could only speak in choppy bursts of screams. One of the wizards of the party used a tongues spell to understand what he was saying. The wizard asked if By-Tor could help them, but By-Tor explained that he required a fine shrubbery for his magic to work. Reluctantly, the party brought him a shrubbery which restored his will to fight. Eventually, the two parties met up once again in a swamp. For whatever odd reason, The Fountain Party never made it to the Fountain of Lamneth, and that entire plotline was abandoned entirely. We chose not to acknowledge that. Anyhow, the two parties banded together to fight a large beast within the swamp, which with their combined power was easier to kill. After leaving the swamp, the party discovered that The Necromancer had completely overtaken Willowdale and Megadon had become close to total corruption. This was told to them by a fire-wielding sorcerer, who said that The Necromancer had also created this evil creature to kill everyone in Megadon. The party went to seek this creature, only to discover that it was a mere rabbit. Despite the rabbit being ravenous with a lust for blood, The party managed to fend it off and kill it. At the end of it all, the sorcerer leads By-Tor and the party to The Necromancer's tower with a strong magical presence around it. Trying their best to fight through the magic and minions of darkness, the party found themselves unable to get to the source of the evil. However, By-Tor seemed unfazed by the magic and allowed the party to fend off the minions for him, paving the way to The Necromancer. It was then that he slew the evil, all sources of magic disappearing and the lands of Willowdale and Megadon were freed from The Necromancer's grasp. Pop Culture References The name of the village Willowdale, while being the name of a town in the Rush song "The Necromancer" is also the place where two of the members of Rush (Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson) lived. The city of Megadon gets its name from the city in the Rush song 2112. While not said in the lyrics themselves, it is explained in the narration which can be found here. The names of the Syrinx Priests also came from 2112. While in the campaign they are not stated to be good or evil, in the original song they are the main antagonists. The Ringmaster and the dead woman in the traveling circus were inspired by the Rob Zombie song Living Dead Girl. The creature with the grotesque face and the demon puppet were inspired by the cover for the Iron Maiden album The Number of the Beast. The way in which By-Tor speaks was inspired by The Knights who say "Ni" from Monty Python. His request for a shrubbery comes from the same scene. The beast in the swamp was inspired by G'mork from The Neverending Story. The swamp itself is a reference to the Swamp of Sadness from the same film. The fire-wielding sorcerer and the bloodthirsty rabbit are references to Tim the Enchanter and the Killer Rabbit from Monty Python.